Pro Football Hall of Famer Ronnie Lott knows a lot about hitting receivers hard. The former standout safety for the San Francisco 49ers excelled at cleaning clocks and laying wood throughout his career, earning a deserved reputation for being one of the toughest defenders who ever played in the NFL.

Lott, teaming up with Hanes to dub the toughest current fans in the NFL (Hint: they’re by the Bay, rooting for one of his other former teams), gave Sporting News his thoughts on the latest season-changing hit in the modern game. There was no other way for Browns safety T.J. Ward to (legally) bring down Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski, Lott notes, during the play on which Gronkowski suffered a season-ending knee injury in Week 15.

"What's fascinating to me about football is, you can go back over the history of playing this game, and people have hit at the knees for a long time,” Lott said. "This isn't the first hit and it won't be the last hit."

Ward was trying to stop a big, physically imposing object in Gronkowski and relied on fundamentals that every NFL defensive back learns.

"You're talking about a guy who's between 6-5 and 6-7, and a guy who's maybe 6-1, 6-2 at best,” Lott said. "Guys are always going to cut guys, trying to get them down to the ground. That's how a lot of guys are taught, and that's the game of football."

"Now the question is, is that safe? Maybe a lot of people would argue that it's not safe.”

Although Lott has noticed some changes that have made offensive players adjust to not going low, it may not be time to implement those for defensive players.

"That area of the game has always been around. They used to call it the cross-body block," he said. "Guys would even block below the waist. Now they took that out of the game. You might have to take that rule out of hitting guys below, and that might be the answer. Right now it's not the answer.”

In the case of Ward vs. Gronkowksi, it was just a matter of contrast in size and position.

“If you're not a big guy, it's hard to take down a lineman (or a tight end),” Lott said. “That's why you use your size to your advantage, by cutting people.”